The List: 15 Nov 1985 (Issue 4)

0 Theatre is listed by city tirst then by venue, running in alphabetical order, except tor touring shows which are listed by the name at the show. Please send details not later than 10 days beiore publication date.

GLASGOW

0 CITIZENS Gorbals Street, 429 0022 /8177. Box Office, Mon-Sat 10am—8pm. Bar. [D] Faustl & ll Until Sat 23 Nov. 7pm. £3 (£1). OAP and Unemployed free on the door, £1 in advance. A major new production of Goethe’s classic masterpiece translated and directed by Robert David MacDonald (See review). 0 THE DRAMA CENTRE 126 Ingram Street, 552 5827. Box Office 9.30am—6pm. A Midsummer Night’s Dream Until Sat 16 Nov. 7.30pm. Donations. A joint production by Roughcast Theatre Company and Strathclyde Theatre Group bringing a new approach to Shakespeare’s play by giving it a Celtic approach, with Celtic music composed for the production by Alan Tall. Directed by Lillian Cattigan. West Mon 25 Nov—Sat 30 Nov. 8pm. Donations. Strathclyde Theatre Group in a production of Steven Berkoff’s anarchic play, directed by Mark Thomson. 0 GLASGOW ARTS CENTRE 12 Washington Street (opp Holiday Inn) 221 4526. Box office Mon-Fri 9am—4.45pm. The Wummin Disappears Until Fri 15 Nov. 7.30pm. £1 .50 (£1). Soor Plooms in a spoof Chandleresque revue in which a detective uncovers a plot to adulterate margarine with a substance that makes women more aggressive. O KINGS Bath Street. Box office Mon—Sat 12 noon—6pm. Phone bookings, Ticket Centre, Candleriggs, Mon—Sat 10.30am—6.30pm. 552 5961. Sinbad the Sailor Mon 25 Nov—Feb 1986. 7.15pm. Mat52.15pm (Mats: Saturday during Week 1; from Week 2 Wednesdays also; from 16 Dec—4 Jan every day).£5.75—£1.0AP and children, selected perfs. £3—£1.50. Johnny Beattie, Una MacLean and Christian may be experiencing déja vu since they co-starred in a production of Sinbad at the King’s Edinburgh last year; but this is a new-look version — new script, new music and new leading lady in the shape of Fletcher Mathers. 0 MITCHELL Granville Street, 221 3198. Box office Mon—Sat. 12 noon—6pm. Tickets also available from Ticket Centre, Candleriggs. 552 5961. Mon—Sat 10.30am—6.30pm. The the and Adventures oi llicholas Nickleby Until Sat 16 Nov. Fri 15 — Part II, 6.15pm. Sat 16— Parts I & II, 1pm and 6.15pm. £3 (£2.25). For

Parts I & II booked at the same time, £5 (£4). David Edgar’s award-winning adaptation of Charles Dickens’ novel presented by Hutchesons Dramatic Club, celebrating their jubilee.

ltobert lialpem Show Until 16 Nov and Wed 20—Sa123 Nov. 7.30pm. £3.50, £3, £2. Wed all seats£2. The entertaining and controversial hypnotist has his audience in his power again.

Pinnochio Until Sat 16 Nov. lOam & 2pm. Sat 2.30pm only. £1 .75. Sat all tickets £2. Philip Charles Productions in a touring show for schools of the moral tale that the Walt Disney ﬁlm brought so vividly to life.

The ltociry iiorror Show Fri 15 & Sat 16 Nov. 11.15pm. £3.50,£3,£2. The original stage version of the outrageously unwholesome show in which the sweet transvestite Frankenfurter encourages Brad and Jan to drop their inhibitions.

Lite oi Galileo Until Sat 16 Nov. 7.15pm. (Sat mat 2. 15pm). £2—£6. The Scottish Theatre Company’s production of Brecht’s drama about the great scientist. Directed by Peter Dews, the production is clear, straightforward and lets the play speak for itself, but lacks sparkle. Tom Fleming’s strong performance as Galileo holds the stage.

Ghosts Fri 15 & Sat 16 Nov. 7.30pm. Sat 16 also 11am (for children). £2.50 (£2). Sat am £1.20 (80p). Forkbeard Fantasy, a company renowned for weird and wonderful effects, present the strange tale of Holcombe Rogus, Ghost Hunter Extraordinaire, whose investigative activities lead to a mysterious disappearance. NB Saturday performance for children. Three Storeys and a Dark Cellar Wed 20 & Thurs 21 Nov. 7.30pm. £3 (£2.50). Another remarkable company specialising in extraordinary effects, IOU Theatre Company have been mounting productions that make inventive use of music and effects for the last nine years. Quite how they will cope with

FAUST

Citizens’ Theatre, Glasgow

Faust is a sprawling epic oi a play, notoriously dlltlcult to stage. Almost ludicrously ambitious in scope, it was written and published at intervals over a period stretching from Goethe's twentieth to his eighty-second year. Yet liobert David MacDonald’s new colloquial translation and innovative direction makes this drama oi the human soul on a lutile quest ior tuitllment into a digestible, stimulating piece at theatre.

Even the prologue which oiten seems an abstract thespian debate is played with the sharp immediacy which hallmarks the whole production: the

Kenny Miller’s reireshingly stark set dispenses with the cumbersome theatrical machinery which usually burdens Faust's adventures. ills study is no “high-vaulted narrow Gothic chamber’, and the traditional chemistry-set clatter oi the scholar detennlned to probe the secrets oi the universe, is replaced by a law books and some contorted anglepoise lamps. Vast shiits in time and space are separated by a tluld Brechtlan curtain which Is used to great visual ellect throughout, particularly when Faust magically produces the shadows oi Helen and Paris.

the comparatively easy challenge of a theatre is difﬁcult to imagine — their most recent tours had them performing in a derelict house, a disused railway siding in Copenhagen and a trailer in Yorkshire. The Third Eye Centre they hope to transform for ‘a haunting delight for an autumn evening’.

Ashes to Ashes Wed 27 Nov 7.30pm. Edinburgh Theatre Workshop. sponsored by the Scottish Health Education Group in a comic production that addresses a serious matter: two young pe0ple ﬁnd themselves in a dilemma when their work for an advertising agency involves them in promoting cigarettes. The production, written by Anne Downie, has been touring the Western Isles and there is a further performance at Castlebay Community School tomorrow (28 Nov, 7.30pm).

htark Lewis as Faust portrays a restless lonely man who utters his last word — ‘This moment is so beautiful, let it stay’ - seated at a flickering computer terminal.

Unsurprisingly however, it is Andrew Wilde's versatile Mephisto who steals the show. He iuily exploits the mercurial twists and silthering patter oi MacDonald’s verse with his endless array oi disguises; one moment he is a cold-blooded gangster, the next a glittering drag queen. Equipped with sunglasses and a phrase book he enters the Classical Greek dream world with all the zest oi a man on a package tour around the Aegean. impeccable comic timing when he scalds himsell by accidentally sitting on Faust’s bible or in his irank aside - this is a terrible experience - when consumed with lust tor the angel, heightens his pertormance. Perhaps it is Goethe’s ilnal irony that not even Satan is spared the messy pain oi human passion.